Friday, February 25, 2011

The Endangered List (Case File #97)

CURSE OF THE MOON CHILD(ca. 1972)

Starring

Adam West

Sherry Jackson

Jeremy Slate

Shown on late-night TV at least once: Friday, October 28th 1977 (Cedar Rapids, IA).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------UPDATE:This just in from T.O.S. researcher and contributor John W. Donaldson...

I found these in two different volumes of The TV Feature Film Source Book (published by Broadcast Information Bureau), which was sold to independent stations across the U.S. so they would know what was available to program for their local TV stations.

This was in the 1983 volume...

CURSE OF THE MOON CHILD was distributed to TV by Gold Key. No U.S. theatrical. On 16mm. It was one of 12 features they syndicated under the label "Zodiac Features Package."

This next entry was in the '73-'74 edition...

Do any of these films exist????????
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------SECOND UPDATE: Over at the Monster Kid Classic Horror Forum, member Doctor Kiss posted about the films in this package a year ago. Click HERE for more info!

As to whether these films exist- it looks like some definitely weren't shot, but at least one other (apparently) was.

In this interview with Classic Images, Ursula Thiess refers to The Left Hand of Gemini as "a sci-fi picture"- and author Michael Fitzgerald calls it Thiess' "last picture to date". (Thiess died in 2010, per the IMDb.)

On this page (http://monsterkidclassichorrorforum.yuku.com/reply/565391/t/Lost-and-Hard-to-Find-movies-the-ones-that-got-away.html) from the Monster Kid Classic Horror Forum, however, poster Dr. Kiss expresses some skepticism about whether the film was actually completed. At the same time (without citing any specific sources, just "interviews"), he says that Christopher Lee said that Vengeance of Virgo was never made- and that Vincent Price and Stephanie Beacham both said that The Aries Computer was never made.

So- it looks like two of the twelve were never made... and I've got my doubts about the majority of the others.

Whatever the status of The Age of Pisces, The Aquarian, and so on, I have to wonder why Gold Key would list a "package" of movies in The TV Feature Film Source Book when some (most) of the movies weren't made. Maybe they gave the info to whomever compiled the book when they were hoping that all of the movies really would be made- or maybe somebody at Gold Key just screwed up?

(And a question for Mr. Donaldson: Were any of the other titles besides Curse of the Moon Child listed in the 1983 edition? Also, I wanted to thank Mr. Donaldson for this information- I had seen several of these titles listed on different filmographies in the book Motion Picture Players Credits, but I had no information on them otherwise; it was great to learn something more about them- even if some/most of them actually don't exist.)